Kurdish Ezidi MP receives Lantos human rights prize
ERBIL, Kurdistan Region (Kurdistan24) – An Ezidi Kurdish politician was awarded the 2016 Lantos Human Rights Prize in Washington DC, United States.
In a ceremony held at the Capitol Hall, Vian Dakhil a Kurdish Ezidi woman and an outspoken member of Iraqi parliament received the 2016 Lantos Human Rights Prize.
During the ceremony, attended by US senators, Dakhil criticized the US President Donald Trump’s executive order banning the people of the seven countries from visiting the US.
It is unjust to consider Kurds terrorists while we have been at forefront of fighting terror, Dakhil said.
In her speech, Dakhil spoke about the challenges the people of the Kurdistan Region and Iraq have endured at the hand of the extremist groups Islamic state (IS), especially the tragedies Kurdish Ezidis have suffered, calling upon the international community to help the victims.
“There is no component of our people who did not suffer,” Dakhil said.
Dakhil, a Kurdish MP on the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) bloc in Baghdad, revealed the figures of Ezidi victims in Shingal and the surrounding areas.
During the IS attack on Ezidi areas 3000 Ezidi men were killed and 6,700 girls and women were kidnapped, she said.
She added that with the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) efforts 2,800 Ezidi girls and women have been freed from the IS captivity but 3,900 of them are still under IS control.
She added that 420,000 Ezidis are displaced in the Kurdistan Region camps and 80 percent of Ezidi villages and cities have been destroyed.
On January 31, Dakhil’s office in a press release stated that the Kurdish MP canceled her trip to the US as a result of the new US travel ban on Iraqi passport holders.
The President of the Lantos Foundation, Katrina Lantos said that the US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson granted Dakhil and her sister special permission to travel to the US and receive the prize.
According to the Lantos Foundation website, the Rights Prize is awarded annually to raise awareness about human rights violations and the individuals committed to fighting them throughout the world.
Editing by Ava Homa